


watch you sleep

by benditlikepress



Category: NCIS
Genre: Ambiguous Relationships, Cuddling & Snuggling, F/M, Family, Sharing a Bed, post-reunion, they make me so soft
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-12-06
Updated: 2019-12-06
Packaged: 2021-02-26 01:59:44
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,219
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21695773
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/benditlikepress/pseuds/benditlikepress
Summary: "Tali didn't sleep for the first week after Ziva got home."a post-reunion Tony, Ziva, and Tali fic
Relationships: Ziva David/Anthony DiNozzo
Comments: 8
Kudos: 111





	watch you sleep

**Author's Note:**

> I wrote this for tumblr but figured I may as well post it on here too. It hasn't even been proofread so sorry for any mistakes!
> 
> title from the song by Girl in Red

Tali didn't sleep for the first week after Ziva got home.

Well, perhaps that was an exaggeration, but she certainly hadn't fallen asleep at night and woken up in the morning.

Tony wasn't wholly surprised - he was used to it, even. She didn't sleep in her own bed for the first month after she began living with him, only passing out in his bed after hours of crying and tantrums. Though his knowledge of children at that point had been alarmingly limited, he knew struggling to get them to sleep in their own bed was something a lot of parents had to deal with. He supposed that most of those parents would have months or years to get their head wrapped around the idea of having to deal with it, though, rather than the length of a conversation with Orli Elbaz. That, along with the weight of everything else that had happened, was probably the reason why he had spent those first few weeks trying not to wake Tali up by crying as she finally dozed off next to him.

The guilt on Ziva's face when Tony told her this was seemingly only second to the guilt she felt for keeping Tony and Tali apart for as long as she had, a choice which she herself seemed to find impossible to explain.

Tony and Ziva, too, had barely slept a wink in the past week. They found themselves waiting until Tali had passed out from exhaustion before they could have the many serious conversations that they had been constructing in their heads for the past six years, and their own sleep schedules were seemingly a thing of a past.

The conversations were sincere, and honest, and while they were a little cold at moments they were never argumentative or angry. Tony was determined to make it clear that he had no patience or energy to hold five-year-old grudges, and Ziva seemed to slowly be accepting this rather than using it as a stick to beat herself with.

She'd also been open about having been ill, about panic attacks and hallucinations and depressive episodes. Though it was clear this was something she suffered much more with since sending Tali to the US, Tony wondered if this might have played a role in why she did what she did - the weight of the world on her shoulders when he saw her in Israel, the guilt, the fear she explained having about telling Tony about Tali after she'd been born. She'd never spoken to him about that kind of stuff before.

It was strange to talk properly again after so long. Ziva had called two years ago to inform Tony of the situation and he had found himself surprised that he still trusted her, blindly, after everything that had happened. He had proved right to when she had shown up on their doorstep a week ago, teary smile on her face and bags under her eyes.

She looked older now, but it was difficult to tell how much of that was ageing and how much was the fact that she, too, didn't seem to have slept since the day she sent Tali away.

They’d barely had time to sit down all week. Tali had decided to show Ziva all of her favourite places: restaurants, the zoo, museums, parks. Ziva found it hard to say no in the circumstances, and Tony had always hated playing the bad cop but especially now when she was so innocently delighted to be the centre of attention.

Tony's first day back at work tomorrow (and Tali's first day back at school) was an added source of anxiety for all of them. They managed to get Tali down in her own bed just past midnight, and Tony was feeling positive until he and Ziva had been in bed for about 40 minutes and he heard her door opening down the hall.

"Aba," the familiar sound of her voice calling from behind the bedroom door had him running his hands over his face. Ziva watched him.

"You need to sleep. Go onto the couch, I will deal with her tonight."

They had dealt with her together every night, as a team, and Tony had usually taken the lead as understandably Tali sought him out first when she was upset.

"You sure?"

"I can sleep while you are both out tomorrow. You need to sleep." She repeated, using her own hand to pull his off his face. He sighed and sat up.

"If you get her to sleep just come sleep out here."

Tony squeezed Ziva’s hand in a gesture of thanks as he stood up wearily. He opened the wardrobe and bent down to retrieve the spare bedding, hearing his knee click at the tired movement. When he opened the bedroom door Tali was stood rubbing her eye with Kelev in her other hand, looking much younger than her 5 years.

“Can’t sleep.” Tali mumbled, looking at Tony and the pillow and blankets in his hand quizzically.

“You hop into bed with Ima, ok, baby?” He ran a hand through her unruly hair. She nodded, now using Kelev’s paw to rub at her eyes.

“Where are you going?”

“Aba is going to sleep because he has work tomorrow. You and me can stay in here.”

Tali accepted this readily, her mood suddenly lifting as she jumped onto the bed beside Ziva. Tony turned back to give Ziva a reassuring smile as he left the room and closed the door behind him.

* * *

Try as he might to get to sleep, Tony found himself lying awake on the pull-out wondering what was going on in his bedroom. His and _Ziva's_ bedroom, he corrected himself, (an unspoken decision when they ended up falling asleep side by side after talking until the early hours), though it still seemed strange to think of it that way and stranger still seeing as he hadn't kissed her since the one filled in equal parts with relief and disbelief when they were first reunited.

They hadn’t spent much time apart since being reunited, but the time he had gotten to himself Tony had spent thinking about that. Analysing his feelings, trying to get a grasp on what it was he wanted. He had spent a lot of time after Ziva rang two years ago questioning how things would be between them, whether he still felt for her the way he always had. The answer was a resounding yes, it was safe to say, but everything was different now. The individual priorities and conflicts that had got in the way in the past weren’t an issue anymore. There was a new priority – a living, breathing, shared one that took up all of their time. Whether this would make it easier remained to be seen (Tony wasn’t sure if crossing Tali or Gibbs was the scarier prospect), but it was an incentive to try even harder. There was no room to run away now, for either of them.

Unable to stop thinking about the quiet behind the door and the distinct lack of Ziva on the pull-out, Tony stood up and made his way back to the bedroom. The door creaked a little as he opened it and he lifted his hand to control the movement, pausing in the doorway to look at the scene.

The bedside light on his side of the bed was still on. Tali was lying on her back on that side, one hand raised on the pillow next to her. Ziva was curled into her, head in the gap between the pillows, hand resting protectively on her daughter's stomach.

Tony wondered how many times they had fallen asleep like this before he had been introduced into Tali's life.

He’d spent much of the past week watching them like this – curiously examining their interactions, the expressions on their faces as they talked. Ziva had been tentative by her standards at first, though that was understandable. Watching them now, you wouldn’t know that. The way she surrounded her was so natural and loving, something special between them. The physical evidence that there was someone else in the world who loved Tali as much as he did, who was as much a part of her as he was, still made Tony’s heart stop.

Of all the things he and Ziva had shared over the years (had it really been 15?), this was the most special.

Tony crossed the room quietly, trying carefully to not disturb either of them as he approached the bed. He placed himself behind Ziva, one of his hands instinctively landing over her waist. Tali didn't stir on the other side of the bed, but after a few moments he felt eyes on him.

"She OK?" he mumbled into the pillow as he burrowed his head down.

"Good. It only took one story. I must have fallen asleep myself." Ziva whispered groggily, and Tony opened his eyes again to meet hers where her head had turned over her shoulder towards him. She seemed a little confused. "I told you to stay out there."

"Couldn't sleep. Wondered where you were."

“I think I was more tired than I realised.”

Ziva turned her head back towards Tali, and Tony lifted the top half of his body a little so he could look at the little girl over Ziva's shoulder. She was still sleeping soundly, brow slightly furrowed. Ziva's fingers that had been on her stomach had moved to her necklace, and she started stroking the Star of David slowly.

"I used to try to take that off her before she went to bed. Didn’t go down well."

"She can be stubborn."

"I think it reminded her of yours." Tony signalled the necklace around Ziva's own neck, and her other hand instinctively raised to the pendant.

"It will get easier." She said quietly, sensing Tony's thoughts. He lowered himself back down to the bed behind her.

"I know." He burrowed his head into the side of her neck a little. "Straight to sleep after 1 story, that's progress."

"We used to fall asleep like this a lot. I wonder if on some level she remembers."

That answered his question from earlier, when he had stood watching them in the doorway. "What stories did you used to tell her?"

"Ones about you, mainly."

The silence that followed was loaded, as Ziva clearly waited expectant of a reply. "Oh yeah?"

"She had that picture by her bed, the one from Paris. She would get into bed and I would pick it up and lie beside her and talk about you."

"Did she ever ask where I was?"

"No," Ziva answered after a beat, "she was still too young. It was a deadline I had set myself. If I had not already done so, the first time she asked where you were, I was going to call you. Every time I roostered out of calling I reminded myself of that."

Tony's smile was instinctive. "Chickened."

"I am out of practice."

"What was your excuse before?"

Tony heard Ziva chuckle a little to herself. She was still watching Tali, head turned away from him.

"If you want to come with me to drop Tali off at school tomorrow, you'll have to walk home. I won't have time to circle back. That OK? It's only 20 minutes."

"Is that alright?"

"Is it alright that you come?" Tony studied the profile of Ziva's expression carefully, a hint of nerves evident. He pressed a kiss to her temple. "Of course it is. She's your daughter, and she'd love you to be there. _I_ would love you to be there."

"Tony, I..."

"What?"

"Thank you. Again."

"I've told you, you don't owe me anything. It's my job to take care of her."

Tony wondered if the weight of the similarity between those words and ones he had said to Ziva all those years ago was on her mind like they were his.

"You are right. Sorry."

"Ziva.." Tony challenged, amusement now hinting in his voice. She turned her head back towards him and he caught her eye as he smiled, their faces close together.

“I know. Stop apologising.” She echoed the words he’d been repeating with a roll of her eyes. “It is just a natural reaction in the circumstances.”

“Well, make new habits.” Tony’s voice got even quieter than the whispers they had been using, as he breathed in the gap between them. Ziva looked down at his lips briefly, and then back at his eyes in a silent question.

Tony lifted himself so he hovered above Ziva, and didn’t pause before leaning down and pressing his lips to hers. It was lazy, and sleepy, and somehow both achingly familiar and entirely foreign as Tony felt Ziva’s lips quirk upwards. They separated after a few seconds and Tony stayed above her, watching as she opened her eyes and a smile played on her lips, before settling back down in bed behind her.

“If that is going to be your solution to everything..”

“Shh. Go to sleep.” Tony playfully dismissed her, burying his face into the space between her shoulder-blades. Ziva grabbed his hand from her stomach and lifted it to her lips, pressing a kiss against his palm before dropping it again.

“Goodnight, Tony.”


End file.
